Hasta La Gadget!

After baptizing the remaining HD DVD faithful, Warner has moved on to teaching new Blu-ray converts the five pillars of faith with a trade-up program. Send in your old DVDs (just the box art won’t cut it this time around, better buy some blanks and get to ripping if you still enjoy Training Day on long car trips), $7.95 – $9.95 per movie plus $4.95 for s&h (orders over $25 ship for free) and expect HD versions back in 4 – 5 weeks. Is it worth it? Depends on how many of the 55 flicks on the approved list you own (included after the break) but for most you’re probably better off keeping the ones you have and eyeing budget bins carefully, nabbing catalog flicks like Harold & Kumar for less than $15 without any mail-in shenanigans shouldn’t be too hard for the truly thrifty.

Continue reading Warner’s DVD2Blu trade-in swaps Blu-rays for your DVDs, Leland Gaunt approves

Filed under: HDTV, Home Entertainment

Warner’s DVD2Blu trade-in swaps Blu-rays for your DVDs, Leland Gaunt approves originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 19 Nov 2009 21:48:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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RealNetworks found itself on the wrong end of a gavel back in August, receiving a court injunction to stop selling its RealDVD software — curiously flying in the face of an earlier ruling in the favor of Kaleidescape. Perhaps that’s why Real isn’t done fighting yet. Or, perhaps it’s just because it doesn’t want to be put out of business. Either way, the company is set to file an appeal and take the show back to court again. Exactly what the basis of their appeal will be remains to be seen — assuming there is one — but here’s to hoping it’s a little more legally sound than their last defense. We’re not quite ready to give up on Fair Use just yet ourselves.

Filed under: Home Entertainment

RealNetworks not giving up on RealDVD, plans to appeal court injunction originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 09 Oct 2009 07:54:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Starting this autumn — which is sort of like now — Tesco stores in the UK will be offering “virtual DVDs” to customers who purchase certain home video titles. Promising no less than a “DVD-equivalent” experience, the new service will be replete with all the menus, copyright warnings and extra bits you’d find on the disc itself, plus additional exclusive content and movie viewing parties with online chat. We’re not entirely sure films need all the added interactivity Microsoft has cooked up, but ambitions are to expand the bonus content and to offer the service in other markets “eventually.” And hey, seeing as it’s based on Silverlight, all that good stuff will be available on Mac too.

Filed under: Home Entertainment

Microsoft and Tesco strike up ‘virtual DVD’ partnership originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 09 Sep 2009 06:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Remember those amazingly cheap doovde players Walmart was so proud of a couple years back? Well, they ain’t so amazing anymore, unless that’s what you’d call a device capable of spontaneously bursting into flames. Sold between January 2006 and July 2009 exclusively at Walmart stores in the US and ASDA supermarkets in the UK, the explosive Durabrand units are being called back due to 12 reported instances of overheating, including five that caused fires. You have to love the irony of skimping on a doovde player purchase, only to pay for it later with “enhanced” insurance premiums. We reached out to Walmart for comment, but they didn’t know what a doovde was. Nevertheless, we captured the conversation after the break.

Update: While we haven’t yet got clear confirmation that ASDA is following suit, we’d be very surprised to not see the product pulled and returns honored in the UK in the same fashion as in the US.

[Via CNN Money; Thanks, Keith]

Continue reading Walmart recalls 1.5 million flammable Durabrand DVD players

Filed under: Home Entertainment, Portable Video

Walmart recalls 1.5 million flammable Durabrand DVD players originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 21 Aug 2009 06:37:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you were hoping for RealNetworks’ “Facet” set-top box to come to market, you probably don’t want to know that Kaleidescape has already done preliminary work on a Blu-ray ripper box, at least according to chief executive Michael Malcolm.

The problem, of course, is that a California appellate court reversed a trial court’s decision and paved the way for Kaleidescape to be sued for breach of contract by the DVD Copy Control Association, making any such product a pretty slim hope for now. But it’s a hope nonetheless.

“We’ve put a lot of work into a Blu-ray product, but we don’t have plans to record Blu-ray onto hard discs unless managed copy becomes a reality,” Malcolm said on Wednesday. “I don’t know if it becomes a reality; it’s really up to the studios. But we’ve certainly done the development work.”